Stuck
by WeBuiltThePyramids
Summary: It used to be Walter coming over in the evenings. And when it was Walter, Ralph was running down the hall to greet him, not feigning sleep at seven thirty. Oneshot.


**The final installment of Calling Out Your Name will be up hopefully by Friday night. In the meantime, I have been majorly angsting over how poor Ralph must feel about this whole love triangle business. I feel the show has made his distress canon, but hasn't...explored it at all, from his side. And the poor boy has got to be something of a mess, no matter what front he puts on.**

 **This is set at some point between We're Gonna Need A Bigger Vote (3x07) and This Is The Pits (3x10). It is dedicated to the brilliant lookingforthestars largely because their work is incredible and when I read things that move me as much as those stories do I get this urge to tell everyone. So read their fics if you aren't already, especially if you ship Waige. You will not regret it.**

* * *

Ralph couldn't sleep.

He had been in his room, on his mother's laptop, when Tim had stopped by. Knowing that Paige had been in the living room watching television and wouldn't know his light was on, Ralph had closed the laptop, flipped the switch, and crawled into bed in the dark. She'd come down the hall not a minute later, probably to let him know that Tim was over. She'd entered his room, seeking her laptop, then closed the door quietly.

Ralph was surprised that it had worked. Never before had he willingly surrendered the laptop before she'd come in to let him know it was time for bed. But things had changed. In more ways than one. It used to be Walter coming over in the evenings. And when it was Walter, Ralph was running down the hall to greet him, not feigning sleep at seven thirty.

Tim hadn't stayed long. Ralph had heard muffled exchanges for ten or so minutes, then a faint _see you tomorrow._ Not a minute later, the television was back on. Ralph didn't get up. It'd be too obvious. Now, at ten o'clock, he still wasn't anywhere close to tired. He couldn't sleep when he was stressed like this, and Tim showing up at their place after work, unexpectedly, stressed him out, no matter how brief the visit.

For now, it wasn't that serious. He knew his mother and Tim went on dates, they'd watch movies on the couch in the living room, but if they were doing anything more than that, they weren't doing it at the condo. Ralph had just started middle school; he was two years away from health class with The Video and chapter nine of the textbook, but he wasn't naïve, and he honestly didn't know how he would react if – when? – Tim spent the night.

But ever since the previous week when he'd gone with his mother and Tim to the dance and they'd met Derrick and Martha Armstrong, Ralph had felt uneasy. The meeting hadn't exactly gone _well_ – it was actually on the awkward side and coming from Ralph that was saying something – but it hadn't been flat out _bad_ either. Paige had hugged both of Tim's parents before the three of them had left that night, and when Tim dropped her and Ralph off at their door, he'd whispered _they really liked you. They don't like a lot of people_ and then kissed her for what Ralph decided was far too long. He knew his mother wasn't thinking about marriage right now. But his brain was wired to look at statistics and Toby was right, this meeting of the parents increased the odds that one day, she and Tim would get married and live together and Ralph would be someone stepson.

He'd never imagined this. It'd hurt when Drew left. He knew his mother cried when she thought he wasn't listening and he had cried too, many times. But they'd pulled themselves together, they'd created a family of just the two of them, and for years, even though she didn't understand him and he didn't even understand themselves, it was them, Paige and Ralph Dineen, against the world.

Tim thought that Ralph's reluctance over his mother's relationship was out of fear that, somehow, he would lose her. He'd pulled him aside one day, shortly before Halloween, and said _look, Ralph, I just want you to know one thing. You will always be the most important person in your mom's life. I don't ever want to be that person, and I'm not going to try. Okay?_

Ralph had muttered a _yeah, whatever._

Tim was wrong. Ralph wasn't hoping that Paige would stay single forever. He loved his mom. He wanted her to be happy and although the two of them had been a little...less close...since she started dating Tim, Ralph knew she would always love him above everything and everyone else.

Despite her now frequent comments about how exhausting and frustrating the geniuses were. People like him.

Ralph aggressively rolled over, balling up his hand into a fist and punching the pillow. When he was younger, he'd never actively wanted a stepdad. There had been times where he was actively glad he didn't have one. _Step_ parents always seemed like a step below what he had with his mother and he didn't want that sort of disjointed family.

But then they'd found Scorpion, Ralph learned that he wasn't alone and he was gifted and sometimes biological family sucked and the family that you created yourself was strong and powerful and nothing _less_.

At first, Ralph had tried to tell himself that Walter O'Brien was a friend. But almost from the very first day, it had felt different. Ralph tried to deny it, even eight months in when he and Paige were racing to the mountain where Walter's car was teetering on the edge of disaster and he'd told her he was crying because _he's my friend._ When he realized that his mother and Walter had feelings for each other – _something_ had changed while Ralph had been visiting Drew a few months following that terrifying day – Ralph had tried to contain his excitement. He had less of a choice in how his life went than his mother did. His mother could choose to be with – or not – anyone that she chose. If she chose to marry again, Ralph would get a stepdad, at least in the technical sense. He couldn't have that on his own and he couldn't reject it. By the nature of his own relationship with Paige, whatever her choices were dictated his own relationships. And if he didn't like it...he was stuck.

But for a while, it'd seemed that maybe, just maybe, the person that Ralph himself loved, the only person he had ever actually desired as a father figure, might end up in that role. Officially.

His thoughts had even gone so far that he'd decided that he would tell him that the term 'stepdad' was as antiquated as 'brothers – in – law." He would call him _dad_. As he and Paige spent more and more time with Walter, he'd started to dream of the day when, maybe, they would do this all the time. He knew that they were moving slowly, but they _were_ moving, and he'd always thought that eventually, they'd want to be together. And then they would be. And they would stay together, because Walter would never abandon them as Drew had, and Paige clung to the people she loved like a lifeline. She wouldn't let him go, once she had him. Ralph was certain of that.

Of course he was stupid to imagine, to dream. _She's with Tim now_ was a common statement around the garage, so much in fact that Ralph sometimes almost dreaded going there. Everyone acted like this was it, that now that she was dating someone that wasn't Walter, that door was permanently closed.

But his mother never talked about Tim when he wasn't around. When the former SEAL was out of town, she and Ralph would regularly go a full day without even bringing him up. She'd blush when he gave her chocolate and her eyes would fall closed when he kissed her. But Ralph knew his mother better than anyone. She didn't look at Tim the way she used to look at Walter. Her breath never caught when she saw the older man, even if she hadn't seen him in days. Even now, sometimes her eyes lit up when Walter walked into the room – and he hadn't gone anywhere.

She was fighting it. Ralph could tell. Every time she and Walter shared something – anything – she would pull away from him. Ralph always felt hopeful when he saw that. Then he'd feel guilty. He didn't want her to be conflicted.

But he did want her to choose who was better for her, and that person just so happened to be who Ralph desperately wanted in his life.

If she married Tim, Ralph and Walter would struggle to maintain their relationship. Ralph was always at school or with his mother and now that his mother was spending less time with Walter, that meant Ralph was, too.

Ralph rolled over again, grunting in agitation as he thought about the conversation he'd had with Walter earlier in the day. Tim had brought Paige lunch, and they were sitting together at her desk, eating it. Walter had slipped upstairs, and Ralph followed him.

 _Usually, they took their stolen time to work on some experiment, or to share and discuss new ideas that had recently been published in the scientific community. This time, they sat together, in silence, on the couch, staring straight ahead._

 _When Ralph had admitted to Walter before the dance that he wished that he wished that he and his mother were together, the older genius had understood, even though Ralph hadn't used those exact words. The look on Walter's face had been..._

" _Walter?"_

 _Walter slowly turned his head to look at Ralph. "Yeah?"_

" _Do you..." He trailed off, wondering if he should even ask. Sometimes it was better not to know. But he was young, a genius who craved knowledge, and... "do you love my mom?"_

 _Walter stared at him in silence for a moment, then looked down to where his hands were folded between his knees. "She's with Tim, Ralph."_

Ralph flipped over again. All Walter had to do, if he didn't love her, was say no. Even if he did...he could have denied it. But he didn't. He just reemphasized the same thing that Toby and Cabe had been telling the boy for the past three months. Ralph's living with a high EQ parent plus all the hours he'd spent with Toby made him understand that it wasn't as if Walter _didn't_ deny it.

It was that he _couldn't_.

"It's _so frustrating_!" He said out loud into his pillow. Walter loved his mother, and she...well...she had to feel something for Walter, too. When she had someone special, she wouldn't let them go. But if she didn't have them yet...

How was it that they cared so much for each other, and yet...they weren't together? _How_ was she with someone else?

How was happiness right at their fingertips, all three of them, but every day, it just seemed to slip farther and farther away?

"Baby?"

Ralph flipped over again at the sound of his mother's voice accompanied by a rapping at the door. Then there was a sliver of light that grew wider, revealing Paige's silhouette. She stepped into the room and flipped on the light. "Are you okay, Ralphie?"

She had to have heard the bed creaking as he tossed and turned. Ralph bit his lip, deciding to lie "I uh...I had a bad dream. A nightmare." He decided to go with a hint of truth. "I'm distressed."

"Oh," Paige sat down on the side of the bed and ran a hand over his back. Ralph looked up at her. "Just breathe, sweetheart," she said. "What was the dream about?"

"Uh," Ralph said. "I..."

"Shhh, don't worry about it," she said, a hand coming up to run through his hair. "It was only a dream. It was only a dream."

Ralph closed his eyes, biting his lower lip. He turned his head, burying his face in the pillow. "It feels real."


End file.
